Learning from our enemies.

Noone can deny the organizational efficiency of the radical Left. They bus in protesters, sometimes professionals, and more often ideologically motivated volunteers, from one city to another cross-country to take advantage of their manufactured media opportunities. Whether the specific issue is Black Lives Matters, or Muslim Refugees, or Abortion Rights, or the LGBTQ agenda, they dominate the coverage and discussion not just because they have the controlled media on their side, but because they are well organized. They have their stuff together. They got this way through community activism, and through networking. Many of those same tactics can be used by patriots, Nationalists, and preppers in building and expanding The ShieldWall Network, for our own purposes.

Saul Alinsky, the Communist Jew who inspired Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, swore by creating organizations, not movements. Alinsky died the same year that I was born, and his highly influential ‘Rules For Radicals’ was published 45 years ago, but I think it’s still worth reading for us, today. Listen to this…

“The most lasting of Alinsky’s prescriptions are not his well-known tactical guidelines — “ridicule is man’s most potent weapon” or “power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.” Rather, they are embedded in a set of organizational practices and predispositions, a defined approach to building power at the level of local communities. Hang around social movements for a while and you will no doubt be exposed to the laws of Chicago-style community organizing: “Don’t talk ideology, just issues. No electoral politics. Build organizations, not movements … Focus on neighborhoods and on concrete, winnable goals.”

What follows in the article is a discussion of how Alinsky’s principles were put into practice, with varying degrees of success by later organizations from Occupy to the Tea Party. As you read the piece, look for the answers to these questions:

What is the difference between an organization and a movement?

What kind of participant should an organization look for?

How should the goals and priorities of an organization be chosen?

How should the organization try to achieve those goals?

In between now and the next ShieldWall Network meeting, read this article and begin thinking about how we can apply these principles of organization for ourselves.